Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Apple Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare the crust
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Prepare the pie crust by mixing flour, salt, and butter until crumbly.
Add cold water gradually until the dough forms.
Roll out the dough and place it in a pie dish.
Fill and bake
Peel and slice the apples, then mix with sugar.
Fill the pie crust with the apple mixture.
Cover with another layer of dough, sealing the edges.
Cut slits in the top crust for steam to escape.
Bake for 45-50 minutes until golden brown.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,706 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Apples
- Provide the main filling, softening as they bake and releasing moisture into the pie.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the filling and helps draw juice from the apples, forming a syrup.
- Butter
- Adds fat that makes the crust tender and flaky and helps it brown.
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the dough, which sets as it bakes.
The step that matters
Cut slits in the top crust. Steam from the filling needs an exit, or pressure can build and push the top crust up or make the filling soggy.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, flour):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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